


gold stars for good behaviour

by evilythedwarf



Series: Five Loves: Kate Austen [5]
Category: Lost
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-18
Updated: 2011-10-18
Packaged: 2017-10-24 18:18:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/266458
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/evilythedwarf/pseuds/evilythedwarf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>he loves Aaron, and she loves them both and sometimes she can even pretend that’s enough</p>
            </blockquote>





	gold stars for good behaviour

**Author's Note:**

> Kate/Hurley, for 5_loves [5/5]: fruit

Jack leaves two days after the memorial. The lies he gave her are too hard for him once he knows the truth and she can’t blame him for doing the one thing she so desperately wants to do. He runs away and she watches him go, holding the baby tight in her arms, as if afraid the truth will wash him away.

Four days after that, Hurley knocks on her door. Over coffee he asks where Jack is and she doesn’t have it in her to tell him he’s gone for good, so instead she says: “He’s not here anymore.” Hurley puts down the steaming mug and looks straight into her eyes. 

“Dude, that sucks.”

That’s when Kate starts to cry.

[and yeah, it’s just like when she was a little girl and her dad was so big and his arms around her made everything better]

Hurley stays in her guest bedroom, providing hugs when needed and playing with Aaron when the baby just won’t keep quiet and Kate’s just this side of imploding because nobody ever told her babies were this hard. Somebody should have told her.

The baby is easily distracted but there’s something in his high-pitched screams that breaks her heart Every. Single. Time. She knows what it’s like to cry for someone who will never be there again. 

[see, that’s why she has to leave the house until she doesn’t feel like crumbling anymore and she can look at her son without feeling like a thief]

He’s got a house of his own and a family who loves him but Kate doesn’t ever ask him why he’d rather stay with her. On a good day, she’ll forget that he’s there and Jack is not and on a bad day, she’ll think that her perfect doctor boyfriend always wanted to fix her and Kate [ _she needs fixing **so**  bad_] knows that’s impossible – she’s too broken. On bad days, she waits for everything to come to pieces around her.

Meanwhile, they feed Aaron applesauce and mashed potatoes for dinner and they are so happy, then.

[he loves Aaron, and she loves them both and sometimes she can even pretend that’s enough]

The backyard is full of trees and she has yet to climb any of them – she wears skirts now. She has white chairs and a table with an umbrella and she feels like she can’t breathe. Hurley is kicking her ass at poker and she’s running out of coins and the sky is tingling orange.

She has a talent for lies, the way some people have a talent for drawing and this life she’s living, it’s nothing more than perfectly carved lies to take away the hard truth. It should be easy but it’s not. She loses her last 25 cents to Hurley’s pocket queens and sighs.

“You win,” she tells him.

He smiles, sweetly, and then looks away, at the orange tree on the far end of her garden. He looks down at his small mountain of glittering coins.

“I bet you three oranges.”

Kate’s fingers shake as she deals the next hand.

[that’s when she makes her choice – it’s going to hurt]

That night she walks down the hall to his room, barefoot and with her hair loose around her shoulders; she feels weightless. She opens his door and he waves at her, asks her what’s up. Kate doesn’t reply, instead she walks towards him and her right hand reaches for his face but stops midway.

“Kate?” he asks, closing his comic book and putting it on his nightstand. She feels likes she’s about to kill someone. She finally strokes the side of his face, thinking he’s the sweetest person she’ll ever meet and that she’s just about to break this thing, this perfect thing they have. 

Straddling him, she rests her hands on his chest, feels his chest rise and fall [faster now]. Hurley says nothing, watching her with huge eyes. She raises her hands above her head and takes off her shirt, slowly, and Hurley, he glances at the wall behind her.

He says her name and she sees the questions building in his eyes, silences him with a kiss and lays flat on top of him. A few beats later, he hesitantly rests a hand on her back and that’s how the end starts. 

[he loves her, will never hurt her, and nothing in the world is scarier than that, so]

She lets herself close her eyes, safe. It’s safe in his arms and that’s something she’s never had. Her eyes always stay open, that stab of fear hidden behind lust or pleasure or love but  **always**  there, waiting for someone to hurt her. 

Hurley is slow and gentle. So big she can lie on top of him as he nervously strokes her back; his hands are soft and tremble a little. She closes her eyes for him, he will never hurt her and [ _she doesn’t want to let go and_ ] it’s scary.

That she won’t get hurt is frightening, but it’s not nearly as terrifying as the knowledge that she will hurt him, in the end, like she hurts anyone who’s ever cared about her.

In the morning, he can’t meet her eyes and it’s painful to watch as he struggles with the words. So she tells him: “I think you should go home.”

And he does.

  
♥

**Author's Note:**

> 16 JULY 2008


End file.
